Very Bad Milk Allergy- Anyone Else?

[Marybobs]

My DS 7 Months is allergic to Cow's Milk. I tried him on the Pepti formula following my GP's advice and he still had such a bad reaction that I had to use his epi-pen. It was very frightening. He swelled and could not breathe. He had hives on his face and body. Only took 1oz and threw it back up after the epi-pen began to work.

He seems to get hives even if I have touched cheese or eaten cheese and onion crisps. He is so sensitive. Has anyone else's child had this so severely and if so are they allergic to anything else?

Weaning him so slowly- so afraid.

He is now on Soya Formula. Can I use soya butter and yoghurt as subsitutes in his food? What are the issues surrounding Soya?

All advice welcomed.

Have used soya milk and yoghurt with my daughter because of exzema reactions to milk. Check you buy milk with added calcium - I bought organic for ages, then realised the lack of calcium, and now she's shot up in height. I would DEFINITELY have a long chat with your dr pronto and get a referral to an allergy specialist. It sounds frightening, but there will be solutions, just make sure you get good professional advice, and prepare to dig around yourself for more info -as you're obviously doing! Good luck!

Ds is pretty sensitive. He came up in hives all over when DH kissed him after having had a cup of tea with milk in an hour previously. He was allergic to Nutramigen and pepti too although not anyphlactic.

I would really suggest that you avoid soya for a while as well. Ds was on 2 soya yoghurts a day on the advice of the dietician and developed an allergy to soya as well as the proteins are so similar to milk proteins. I really really wish I had avoided soya until he was a lot older as having a dairy and soya allergic child is really hard, it's almost impossible to find bread they can eat.

I woud ask for Nutramigen AA or Neocate rather than soya formula as they don't contain any cow's milk at all.

We use Oatly in cooking and for drinking now DS is nearly 3. We use pure sunflower spread. There is no good alternative to dairy or soya yoghurt unfortunately.

He has now outgrown the soya allergy thankfully and the dairy allergy does seem to be reducing in severity, he managed to eat a kit kat by mistake and didn't seem to react at all, fingers crossed it goes completely.

Oh and it does become easier as you build up a repertoire of dairy free recipes and it just becomes part of normal life. It is pretty scary weaning an allergic child though. It took DS ages, I think he was nearly 10 months before he strted eating well. I think allergic children are naturally more cautious.

sorry not milk allergic, but similar reactions to his multiple allergens, contact hivey reactions lessoned at 5-7 years.

tough years when there young, been there got that t-shirt....

I can't advise cause ds1's dairy allergy was pretty mild but I can sympathize. One of ds's friends is anaphylactic to milk - he also reacts to the tiniest amounts touching his skin (hives not anaphylaxis). He was also allergic to eggs until recently but has just outgrown that at 4.5.

He was taught at a very, very early age to never eat anything unless his mum or dad OKed it. They do have milk in the house and his little sister has her bottle lying around but he would never touch it. Obviously your ds is too young to look out for himself just yet but from about 18 mo you can start teaching him to be careful (I used to push ds1 around the supermarket letting him see me reading the labels and chanting 'oh no can't have that it's got nuts in (his other allergy is to peanuts)).

The early days are the worst though, esp. with milk cause it is everywhere you go, esp at play groups etc. It can be enormously stressful but it ~does get better, honestly it does .

DS1 (now 6) has a serious dairy allergy though not as severe as you describe. I'd reiterate what the others are saying - it's so hard when you first find out, but it does get easier and you get your own kitchen sorted and then figure out how to cope with going out! and my son has always been extremely good about only taking my food (from about age 3 once he could communicate well).

With soy, the issue as I understand it is that it contains phyto-oestrogens, which are plant-based compounds that mimic oestrogen, and the doctors don't really know whether this could have an adverse effect, especially on boys and fertility. So the advice we were given (in France) was to limit his intake to say 2 soy yoghurts a day, and use a different kind of formula milk (we had Neocate as he reacted to Pepti Junior and Nutramigen). But this was at 18 months, so it may be best to avoid soy completely for a bit longer. Definitely definitely get an appointment with an allergy specialist asap.

Good luck...

my 2 suufer from multiple food allergies including both cmp & soy allergy .
my advice, avoid soy like the plague if you can.
i've found not only does it cause very sore tummys and runny nappies, the ph is affected in the stools so we end up with very very sore bottoms.
i've been showed by the hosp how to treat these 'welts' as they must be treted as burns, but unfortunatly he still has some marks on inside of his legs from the burns.

My milk-allergic DCs were also allergic to beef. They came out in hives and some swelling but no anaphylaxis. They eventually developed mild asthma; one has severe seasonal allergies to pollen of different kinds too but she may have inherited that from me (she uses loratidine daily all year now). They are also allergic to aspirin and ibuprofen.

I found grocery shopping a nightmare and would urge you to never relax about anything you buy -- you should check labels every time because sometimes the ingredients change. I bought hardly any prepared foods, and did a huge amount of home cooking from scratch, still do. I found a book by Doris Rapp, 'Is This Your Child?' very helpful. I don't know if it's still in print.

Soy wasn't a problem for my DCs, but actually only the oldest was exposed to much of it after I stopped bfing her at one year; the others were bfed for a good deal longer and graduated to water and fortified fruit juice. I think the general consensus on soy is that the phyto estrogens are not good news, for boys especially. Some 'soy' imitations of dairy products actually have cow milk casein in them, so beware. I found my DCs could tolerate sheep and goat cheese very well.